Graduate Student
in Philosophy, History & Philosophy of Science
| J. Brian
Pitts Graduate Student Mailing Address: Department of Philosophy University of Notre Dame 100 Malloy Hall Notre Dame, IN 46556 History and Philosophy of Science Graduate Program E-Mail: jpitts@nd.edu |
 |
| Education: |
Ph.D., Philosophy, University of Notre Dame,
expected 2008, supervisor Don
Howard;
Dissertation: "General Covariance, Artificial Gauge Freedom and
Empirical Equivalence"
M.A. in History and Philosophy of
Science,
University of Notre Dame, 2006
Ph.D. in physics, University of Texas at Austin, 2001
B.S. in physics, Georgia Tech 1995
| Areas of Interest |
Philosophy of Physics
History and Philosophy of Science
Philosophy of Time and Space
Public Understanding of Science
Philosophy of Religion
| Selected Papers: |
"Why the Big Bang Singularity does not Help the Kalam Cosmological Argument for Theism," forthcoming in The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science; Philsci-archive.pitt.edu.
"Absolute Objects and Counterexamples: Jones-Geroch Dust, Torretti Constant Curvature, Tetrad-Spinor, and Scalar Density," Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 37 (2006) 347-371; Philsci-archive.pitt.edu, gr-qc/0506102v4.
With W. C. Schieve, "Universally Coupled Massive Gravity," Theoretical and Mathematical Physics 151 (2007) p. 700, gr-qc/0503051v3; also in Russian.
"Constrained Dynamics of Universally Coupled Massive Spin 2-spin 0 Gravities,"
Journal of Physics: Conference Series 33 (2006) 279-284. Talk given at QG05, Cala Gonone, Sardinia, Italy, September 2005. hep-th/0601185.
Review of The Command of Light: Rowland's School of Physics and the Spectrum by George Kean Sweetnam (American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia), Aestimatio 2 (2005) 33-8.
With William C. Schieve, "Null Cones and Einstein's Equations in Minkowki Spacetime," Foundations of Physics 34 (2004) 211; gr-qc/0406102.
With W. C. Schieve, "Nonsingularity of Flat Robertson-Walker Models in the Special Relativistic Approach to Einstein's Equations," Foundation of Physics 33 (2003) 1315; IARD 2002 proceedings; gr-qc/0406103.
"Gravitation with a Flat Background Metric," dissertation supervised by William C. Schieve, Department of Physics, The University of Texas at Austin; related work at Philsci-archive.pitt.edu and gr-qc/0111004.
With W. C. Schieve, "Light Cone Consistency in Bimetric Gravitation," in Relativistic Astrophysics: 20th Texas Symposium (December 10-15, 2000, Austin, Texas), ed. John C. Wheeler and Hugo Martel, p. 763, AIP; gr-qc/0101097.
With W. C. Schieve, "Slightly Bimetric Gravitation," General Relativity and Gravitation 33 (2001) 1319; gr-qc/0101058.
Served as a referee for Foundations of Physics Letters and Foundations of Physics
| Selected Presentations: |
“Is General Relativity Generally Covariant? Anderson-Friedman Absolute Objects, Spinors and the Metric’s Determinant,” University of Maryland, Foundations of Physics Group, February 4, 2008.
“Empirical Equivalence and General Covariance: Insights from Artificial Descriptive Redundancy,” Department of Philosophy, University of Leeds, January 9, 2008.
"General Covariance and the Absolute Object in General Relativity," Tenth Eastern Gravity Meeting EGM10, Cornell University, June 2007. http://baba.astro.cornell.edu/~ecgm10/
"Absolute Objects, Counterexamples and General Covariance," 15th UK and European Meeting on the Foundations of Physics, University of Leeds, Leeds, England, UK, March 2007.
"The Anderson-Friedman Absolute Objects Program: Several Successes, One Difficulty," PSA 2006: Philosophy of Science Association, Vancouver, British Columbia, November 2006.
Commentator on Bradford Skow's "Sophisticated Substantivalism and Spacetime Symmetries," American Philosophical Association, Central Division, April 2006.
"Astronomical Ages and Genesis: Starlight Transit Time and Its Theological Reception," The History of Science Society 2005 Annual Meeting, November 2005, Minneapolis.
"Constrained Dynamics of Universally Coupled Massive Spin 2-spin 0 Gravities," Fourth Meeting on Constrained Dynamics and Quantum Gravity QG05, Cala Gonone (Sardinia, Italy), September 2005.
"Gravity as (Really) a 'Spin 2' Universal Force in Minkowski Spacetime,"
International Conference on the Ontology of Spacetime, Concordia University, Montreal, May 2004
"Updating Reichenbach on Universal Forces and Geometric Conventionality,"
12th International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science, Oviedo, Spain, August 2003
"The Special Relativistic Approach to Einstein's Equations," 12th Midwest Relativity Meeting, University of Chicago, September 2002
"The Special Relativistic Approach to Einstein's Equations," 11th UK Conference on the Foundations of Physics, University of Oxford, September 2002.
"The Special Relativistic Approach to Einstein's Equations," IARD 2002: 3rd Biennial Meeting, International Association for Relativistic Dynamics, Howard University, Washington, June 2002
"The Special Relativistic Approach to Einstein's Equations," 18th Pacific Coast Gravity Meeting, University of California at Davis, March 2002
"Causality and General Relativity in Flat Spacetime," Texas Section of the American Physical Society, Fall Meeting, Fort Worth, Texas Christian University, October 2001.
"Gravitation with a Flat Background Metric," dissertation defense, The University of Texas at Austin, Department of Physics, July 2001
"Slightly Bimetric Gravitation," Texas Section of American Physical Society, Fall Meeting, October 2000, Rice University, Houston
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PhotographsBrian Pitts
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